Those bike lane bikers are whizzing by and not taking the time to carefully check if someone *might* be standing there with a Bugaboo! Or a Stokke! Also, now the bike lane is making it harder to see oncoming traffic for the mamz:

“They think they own the road, they don’t stop when they’re crossing [an intersection],” said Rita Martinez, pushing her 2-year-old son into the park. “They always think they have the right of way — sometimes they’ll just scream to get out of the way when I’m pushing a stroller!”

Perhaps this is a good time to revisit the rules of Park Slope for anyone who is unfamiliar with how shit works around here:

Whether on land, sea, or air, BREEDERS always, always, have the right of way within the geographical boundaires of Park Slope. This right supersedes all other state laws or city regulations.

The bigger the stroller, the *more* right of way a BREEDER will expect. Major bonus points for those double or triple strollers.

Okay, okay, you can file this one under "technically not in Park Slope." BUT, if you can get your lazy asses on the train and go a few stops up to DUMBO, you'll be in for a treat.

The fourth annual NYC Food Film Festival features an array of short films that are food-centric. On tap for this year, we have Smokes & Ears, a doc about how good a pig ear sandwich can be (what?!), The Perfect Oyster, where a guy waxes poetic about—you guessed it—the perfect oyster, and many more. THEN, they've got food events where you can eat some of the things you saw on-screen.

Genius, right?

There are a few events happening throughout Manhattan (including the unfortunately named oyster bash, "Suck 'n' Shuck"), but check out the sick events happening right here in Brooklyn.

If you’re unfamiliar with FIPS Food Throwdowns, it’s a monthly series where we order the same exact thing from two different Park Slope restaurants, get it delivered, and evaluate which was better. It's a culinary smackdown...a triumph of the delivery will.

This month, it's pizza, and truth be told, I was more excited about this than the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. And we know how much those heros on a half-shell love their goddamned pizza.

Say yes to pizza (and obesity!), say no to drugs!

You would honestly think that ordering a couple stupid pizzas would be easy, so I headed over to Erica's apartment so we could plot world domination and stuff our faces. But it wasn't true. IT JUST WASN'T TRUE.

Be nice and welcome, Kitty. She blogs here and may write about some shit HERE.

I’ve been living in Brooklyn all of my thirty-one years, and while the bulk of the borough has become somewhat of a big cluster-fuck of benignity, the one place you can consistently count of seeing some bona fide Brooklyn attitude is down in Coney Island. I was raised on the mainland of Coney, in Gravesend, and for whatever reason, I regularly forget just how straight insane the area is.

And when I say insane I mean that in the good way –-like the aunt everyone is scared to invite to family events but winds up being the life of the party each and every time. Coney Island is attitude. And Coney Island on Mermaid Parade day takes that attitude and clumps onto it a nice serving of huge boobs, libidoed up boys and way too much alcohol. This is the combo meal that keeps me comin back year after year.

Meredith's C-Town post reminded me of the question that would have been burning inside me had I not forgotten it instantly upon exiting Trader Joe's in Cobble Hill: WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS PEOPLE?

I want to see the corporate training manual because this over-friendly cool-aid swilling chit chat is just plain wrong. And it seems to be as endemic as those hawaiian shirts.

As you know, I am a serious infipstigative journalist, and so I made it my business this morning to do a little research.

That photo above, by the way? On some woman's blog with the following quote: "One of the clerks saw what we were doing and ran over saying, 'Wait, you can't take pictures without a Trader Joe's Guy!'"

Oy.

I know: I'm a curmudgeon. But, really, I'm not. There's just a fine line between good service and freakish, glass-eyed love-huggishness.

"I live in NYC where the clerks are often sullen and won't say thank you (even after the customer says it) so believe me, it's not that I don't appreciate friendly service. I just don't like the "play by play" Howard Cosell "What, ANOTHER bag of frozen blueberries, WOW" kind of commentary, by someone who is ringing up my groceries."

"I consider the perkiness as the price we pay for them not being sullen."

"Without fail, I’ve always felt like my cashier was hitting on me. Men and women cashiers alike. They are more interested in what I did this weekend than most of the guys I’ve dated in the past year. They engage you in chitchat, they smile at you, they make lingering eye contact. And THEY ALL DO IT."

I'm just not sure what sort of Walt-Disney-themed corporate training that the cashiers are put through to become so obnoxiously involved with their customers at check-out. I'm all for a smile or two, but these people just take it way too far.

[ed note: In a VERY bizarre twist of fate, I have the following confession to make: I kind of dig the over-the-top friendliness of the TJ folks. Much like the "layering" of my toppings at Forty Carrots frozen yogurt, it makes me feel like they care. Even if they ARE just acting their faces off--Erica].